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Once again a new wave of executions in Iran seem to be IRI's response to its condemnation for gross violations of human rights by the General Assembly of the United Nations.

These statistics are drawn from ABF’s daily surveys of more than 50 newspapers, websites, and blogs. The majority of these executions have been announced by the authorities themselves or reported by the semi-official media inside Iran. The exact number of executions is difficult to assess, however, as the reports are not always systematic and complete. Moreover, the Iranian authorities do not allow the independent investigation and monitoring of cases in which the death penalty is enforced. The numbers above include only individuals executed after formal judicial proceedings and do not include any who have died in detention or those assassinated or killed by security forces.

Reported executions in Iran
November 2008 9
This year (2008) 321
Last year (2007) 466

The official overseeing the execution was quoted as saying "the woman was convicted of killing her temporary marriage husband by cutting him into pieces."

Vatan Emrouz newspaper, identifying the woman as Fatemeh Pajoh, said she was "suspicious" of her temporary husband, but gave no details.

Some Iranian human rights groups have said she killed her husband for raping her daughter.

In Shiite Islam, men and women are permitted to marry on a temporary basis.

Iran's judiciary insists that retribution in murder is a private right and that is up to the victims' families to determine whether the death sentence should be carried out.

Under Iranian law, a murder victim's family can spare a convict's life by accepting blood money. Some families have also been known to forgive a murderer without demanding compensation.

Many of the convicts are poor, making it hard to to raise the blood money, which is officially set at 55,000 dollars although some families demand more.

The human rights groups, notably the human rights defenders circle led by the Iranian lawyer and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi, have repeatedly criticised the rising number of executions in Iran.

The latest hangings bring to at least 216 the number of executions in Iran this year, according to an AFP count.

Amnesty International says Iran carried out more death sentences in 2007 than any other country apart from China, executing 317 people.

TEHRAN GREETS CHRISTMAS WITH MORE EXECUTIONS! Today, while many in the world celebrate the message of ‘peace on earth, good will to men’, the blood-thirsty tyrants in Tehran have marked the day with their own trade-mark: death and intolerance.

The year is not over yet but with 317 executions the regime has broken its own record for recent years and holds the dubious and shameful second place, after China, as the world champion government of murder. Once again women and children constitute a good part of this year’s list of victims. For how long is the civilized world and its decent people are going to remain silent in face of such atrocities?

This government should be driven out of all international organizations and any other legitimate gathering of democratic governments. Let this out-law regime Keep Company with Cuba, Zimbabwe, North Korea and similar despicable dictatorships. To remain indifferent in face of all these barbarous acts will not be judged lightly by history. No nation and no government in the world can claim tomorrow that they were not aware of the fact that an entire nation has been taken hostage by this unlawful government which is responsible for such heinous acts in Iran

Brothers Arash and Kamiar Alaei, noted for work on AIDS issues in Iran, are accused of subversion through their Western contacts. Their trial has stirred international protests.
By Ramin Mostaghim and Borzou Daragahi
January 20, 2009
Reporting from Tehran and Beirut -- A top Iranian counter-intelligence official said two renowned AIDS physicians with ties to the United States were among a group of people on trial on charges of participating in an alleged American-backed underground espionage cell, Iran's official Islamic Republic News Agency reported Monday.

Brothers Arash and Kamiar Alaei, noted for work on AIDS issues in Iran, are accused of subversion through their Western contacts. Their trial has stirred international protests.
By Ramin Mostaghim and Borzou Daragahi
January 20, 2009
Reporting from Tehran and Beirut -- A top Iranian counter-intelligence official said two renowned AIDS physicians with ties to the United States were among a group of people on trial on charges of participating in an alleged American-backed underground espionage cell, Iran's official Islamic Republic News Agency reported Monday.

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Two Iranian doctors whose arrests last year sparked concern in the West are among people accused of involvement in a U.S.-sponsored plot to overthrow Iran's Islamic system of government, a news agency reported Monday.Iran's judiciary last week said four people had been arrested in connection with the plot, which it said was financed and supported by the United States, but it did not name them.

"Intelligence Ministry officials gave the names of two of the four arrested ... as doctors Arash and Kamiar Alaei," the semi-official Fars News Agency said.

The European Union in August called on the Islamic Republic to release the two doctors, who specialize in the treatment of HIV/AIDS and who were arrested in June. The U.S. State Department has also expressed concern.

Iran often accuses the West of seeking to undermine the Islamic state through a "soft" or "velvet revolution" with the help of intellectuals and others inside the country.

Thirty years after Ayatollah Khomeini's bloody revolution, more than 80% of Iranians have distanced themselves from the autocratic rule and the obligatory harsh form of Islam that is imposed upon them.

When a menacing and antagonistic Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini emerged to commence his despotic Islamic Revolution in 1979, he could not have envisioned that very soon the majority of his followers and believers would go against his religious ideology.

He had the full support of devoted Muslims, as well as Communists and other political fashion victims of the time such as Fada’is, Mojahids, youngsters, and even a few so called "intellectuals", not to mention the local thugs and gangs.

It is common belief now that despite the hyperbole of the Western media at the time, the exact numbers of the demonstrators and revolutionaries were far lower than reported, and those who participated, certainly did not represent the silent majority of the Iranian population of 36 million.

Specifically, not every Iranian bought into the revolution, especially the Islamic version. Nonetheless, the ayatollah did enjoy the support of a large portion of the eligible voters of the time.

In addition to the strong support of his active followers at home, foreign governments such as the ex-Soviet Union, Western democracies and international media, all threw their weight behind him. Amusingly a few of them even regarded him as a new saint or another Mahatma Gandhi, who had risen to bring a new order to wealthy Iran and the oil-rich Persian Gulf region and to dignify humanity.

It did not take long for the ayatollah's saintly image to wash away and for all those naïve supporters to learn the true nature of his backward religious idealism.

From the hostage crisis, to evil human rights violations; to the sponsoring of the world’s leading terrorists, to waging war on free and democratic countries; the black revolution of 1979 has come at a cost to the reputation of the Iranian people and has created a lawless nation which does not respect any international protocols and laws.

The Iranian people and the international community has learned from the past thirty years, all be it unintentionally, that true distinctions can be drawn in the history books. There is a clear cut “before and after” folio; neither of which should be taken for granted.

A true appreciation of what Iran was, once upon a time and a deep regret of what it has become is shared across the world over. This lesson has not come without a great price. To now truly realize the ramifications of such a dangerous power in the world is unfortunate yet unavoidably necessary.

It IS astonishing that such a backward archaic ideological regime has managed to survive in this innovative and pioneering civilization of the 21st century.

Yet the history books have not finished being written. Having realized that international efforts are ineffective, it is up to the Iranian people to once again write their own history.

"Nicole Sadighi is a writer and fellow researcher for the Center for the Promotion of Democracy and Human Rights in Iran."

The Australian Government is ''deeply concerned'' at news that seven leaders of the Iranian Baha'i community have been charged with spying for Israel, insulting Islam and distributing anti-Iran propaganda. The seven may be executed if found guilty in a Revolutionary Court trial scheduled this week.

A Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade spokeswoman said the lack of due legal process ''makes it hard to believe there is any basis to the charges or that they will receive a fair trial''.

The Australian Baha'i community is calling for the immediate release of the seven.

Australian Baha'i Community's Canberra spokeswoman Tessa Scrine said the accusations were baseless.

Australian relatives of the accused are deeply worried.

Roya Kamalabadi, who lives in Melbourne, knows little about where her sister is being held or what condition she is in.

Fariba Kamalabadi, 46, is a psychologist and mother of three children.

Iran's ambassador to Australia, Mahmoud Movahhedi, said all governments had a responsibility to maintain order and bring to justice those suspected of criminal offences.

The United States, the European Union, Britain and Brazil have all issued statements condemning the Iranian Government's treatment of the seven leaders.

Persecution of Baha'is in Iran is getting more and more Western media attention, with the trial set to begin next week of seven Baha'i leaders accused of spying for Israel.

Actor Rainn Wilson, a member of the Baha'i faith who plays paper salesman Dwight Schrute in the U.S. version of "The Office," has weighed in with a commentary for CNN.com:

They've been accused of all manner of things including being "spies for Israel," "insulting religious sanctities" and "propaganda against the Islamic Republic."

They've been held for a year in Evin Prison in Tehran without any access to their lawyer (the Nobel Laureate Shirin Ebadi) and with zero evidence of any of these charges.

When a similar thing happened in 1980, the national leadership of the Iranian Baha'i community disappeared. And this was repeated again in 1981.

In fact, since 1979, more than 200 Baha'is have been killed, holy places and cemeteries desecrated, homes burned, civil rights taken away and secret lists compiled of Baha'is (and even Muslims who associate with them) by government agencies.

RFE/RL spoke to the sister of one of seven Baha'is on trial this week. She said that her sister was detained solely on the basis of her faith, which is not recognized by the Iranian Constitution.

Other faiths in Iran are also being squeezed. As RFE/RL reported yesterday, a house of worship belonging to Sufi dervishes has been destroyed by the authorities.

Washington, 19 February (IranVNC)—Iran is engaging in a “systematic” effort to “eradicate” the banned Baha’i faith in that country, a senior analyst at the US Commission on International Religious Freedom [USCIRF] told IranVNC yesterday.

On Tuesday, Iran’s Judiciary spokesperson, Alireza Jamshidi, said that seven Iranian members of the national Baha’i coordinating committee, charged with espionage, could be indicted by next week. The seven individuals have been held in Tehran’s Evin Prison, since their arrests in March and May 2008.

“There’s now a systematic, clear effort to eradicate and destroy the Baha’i community at large,” said Dwight Bashir, a senior policy analyst at the USCIRF.

Bashir told IranVNC that the seven Baha’is who were charged with espionage were part of a coordinating group for educational and other social activities.

“So these kinds of activities and so clearly the charges that are being leveled by the regime here, I think add to the growing concern that there could be some ominous results in the days and weeks ahead,” he said.

Source URL: http://news.bahai.org/photo/2168
Haleh Rouhi, Sasan Taqva and Raha Sabet were taken into custody in November 2007. They are serving a four-year sentence on charges connected entirely with their belief and practice in the Baha'i Faith.

"Bahais were the first people in Iran to educate girls," she says. "If a Bahai couple has a son and a daughter and only enough money for one, the faith teaches it should be the daughter, because she's going to be a mother and her children's first educator."

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GENEVA — A 46-year-old mother of three, a 75-year-old retired factory owner, a 35-year-old optometrist — these are among the Baha'i leaders imprisoned in Iran whose case may soon go to the Revolutionary Court. Here are short profiles of the members of the ad hoc coordinating committee being held in Evin prison.

Mona Mahmudnizhad (September 10, 1965 - June 18, 1983) was a Persian Bahá'í who, in 1983, together with nine other Bahá'í women, was sentenced to death and hanged in Shiraz, Iran because of her membership in the Bahá'í Faith.[1][2][3]

Childhood
Mahmudnizhad was born on September 10, 1965 to Yad'u'llah and Farkhundeh Mahmudnizhad, who had left their home in Iran to teach their religion in Yemen. She was the second child in the family; the family's first daughter, Taraneh, was seven years old at the time of Mahmudnizhad's birth. Mona spent her first four years in Yemen; at age two, she was hit by a car and thrown to the sidewalk, but sustained no serious injury.[4]

In 1969 the government of Yemen expelled all foreigners and the Mahmudnizhad family returned to Iran. They spent two years in Isfahan, six months in Kirmanshah and three years in Tabriz before finally settling in Shiraz in 1974. During this time her father repaired small appliances for work and served the Bahá'í community as part of various Bahá'í administrative bodies.[4]

Arrest, interrogation, and sentencing
While Bahá'ís regularly faced persecution in Iran, the Islamic Revolution of 1979 refocused the persecution.[1][5] At 7:30pm on October 23, 1982, four armed revolutionary guards, sent by the public prosecutor of Shiraz, entered the Mahmudnizhad household and ransacked the home in search of Bahá'í material. When they were finished they took Mona and her father into custody. The two were blindfolded and taken to Seppah prison in Shiraz, where they were placed in separate quarters; Mahmudnizhad was detained in Seppah prison for a total of 38 days.[4]

On November 29, 1982, she and five other Bahá'í women were transferred from Seppah prison to Adelabad prison, which was also in Shiraz. After some time in Abelabad she was transferred to the Islamic Revolutionary Court where she was interrogated and then returned to prison. A few days later, she was once again taken from the prison and interrogated in front of an Islamic Revolutionary Judge.[4] After these series of interrogations Mahmudnizhad was found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging.[3] At the time of her sentencing, the President of the United States, Ronald Reagan, made a plea for clemency, despite this, the sentence of the 10 women was carried out on the night of June 18, 1983, in a nearby polo field.[2]

The names and ages of the other women who were hanged with Mahmudnizhad were:[4]

Pop culture
Mahmudnizhad's story is the subject of several art works; music artist Doug Cameron recreated Mahmudnizhad's story in a music video, Mona with the Children, which made the the pop charts in Canada (#14 for the week of October 19, 1985).[6] The video was distributed throughout the music scene and was effective in bringing the human rights situation of the Bahá'ís in Iran to the attention of the public.[1] More recently a play, A Dress for Mona has been produced[3] and currently Jack Lenz is working on a movie called Mona's Dream.[7]

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TEHRAN (AFP) — An Iranian man who was sentenced to death by stoning after he was found guilty of having illicit relations with a teenage girl has been hanged, a newspaper reported on Saturday.

Abdullah Fareivar, a 50-year-old music teacher, was hanged on Thursday in a prison in the northern town of Sari, the Etemad Melli newspaper said.

It said Fareivar was sentenced to death despite his family saying his relations with the 17-year-old girl were not illicit as he had entered into a contract marriage with her and that his first wife was aware of it.

Under Iran's Islamic law, adultery is still punishable by stoning, which involves the public hurling of stones at a partially buried convict. A man is buried up to his waist and a woman up to her shoulders.

Convicts are spared if they can free themselves.

Five Iranians have reportedly been stoned to death in the past four years, including two men in Mashhad in December, despite a 2002 directive by judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahrudi imposing a moratorium on such executions.

Another six Iranians -- five women and a man -- are in prison awaiting stoning.

Such executions have drawn international condemnation, with the United Nations and the European Union calling on Iran to abolish stoning.

Iranian rights campaigners have also urged the Islamic republic to remove the punishment from the statute book.

In August, the judiciary said it has scrapped the punishment in Iran's new Islamic penal code, whose outlines have been adopted by parliament but whose details have yet to be debated by MPs.

Fareivar's hanging brings to 46 the number of people executed in Iran since the beginning of the year.

Iran executed 246 people in 2008, according to an AFP count.

The Islamic republic has stepped up its use of the death penalty since last year in what it says is a bid to improve security in society.

Amnesty International says Iran carried out more death sentences in 2007 than any other country, apart from China which executed 317 people.